


By Faith Alone

by nostalgia



Series: By Faith Alone [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Aliens Made Them Do It, Dubious Consent, F/M, Gen, oldfic, post-S4 somehow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-10
Updated: 2014-07-10
Packaged: 2018-02-08 05:40:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1928724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nostalgia/pseuds/nostalgia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor and Donna visit an alien planet and it all goes wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	By Faith Alone

"This is great," said Donna. They were sitting at a banquet table enjoying a feast put on in their honour after the locals had declared Donna to be a flame-haired goddess. Or at least remarkably similar to one.

"Told you we'd get somewhere nice eventually, no one arresting us or trying to kill us."

"I'd almost forgotten what it's like not to have to run away from someone as soon as you've said 'hello.' Been ages since I was a guest of honour at something," she said, sipping a glass of what probably wasn't champagne. "Maybe I'll meet a fit young man with a thing for flame-haired goddesses."

"Donna..." the Doctor began.

"What? You can have it off across time and space and I can't?"

"I never said that!"

"It was implied."

"It's a _fertility_ festival, contraception would be right out."

"Oh. Yeah, that does put me off a bit. You too, I'd hope. God knows how many kids you have wandering about."

"None, as far as I know," said the Doctor, rather too lightly.

Donna bit her lip."Nice stone circle they have here," she said by way of an obvious distraction.

"Technically it's a henge."

"River tell you that?" asked Donna, slightly tipsy.

"Benny. She was great, you'd have liked her."

"Did you shag her as well?"

"Um," said the Doctor. 

"What _is_ it with you and archaeologists?"

"She might not have been an archaeologist!"

"She was, though, you had that look in your eye like when we're watching Indiana Jones."

"A henge," the Doctor repeated. "You know, I wonder if these people had some sort of contact with your ancestors. Though putting rocks in a big circle isn't really one of the universe's more complex ideas."

"So what did Time Lords do that's so impressive?"

"You know the way the galaxy's a spiral?" He twirled a finger to demonstrate.

"Yeah?"

"That."

Donna looked at him for a bit and then laughed. "You bloody liar!"

"How would you know? Were you there?"

"Were you?"

"Not in an _official_ capacity..."

Donna punched him lightly on the arm. "I don't believe half of what comes out of that mouth of yours."

The Doctor rubbed his arm where she'd hit him. "Anyway, don't you think this is great? A genuine stage two religion _and_ phase three technology. Brilliant, I love it! I can't wait until tomorrow!"

"What's tomorrow?"

The Doctor read from a schedule someone had handed him when they arrived. "Tomorrow they re-dedicate the main altar. Probably a lot of chanting involved, but fascinating from a xenocultural perspective."

"Is it fascinating from a Donna Noble perspective?"

"Probably not, no."

"Do they have shops on this planet?"

"Donna, every planet has shops, even Planet Marx."

"Marks and Spencers have a planet?"

"Marx and _Engels_. But yes, they did have one for a while. It just didn't work out, what with the killer christmas lights and all that."

"So I'll go shopping and you go to your chanting thing."

"Deal," he said, and they shook hands. He smiled at her. 

"What?"

He shrugged. "Your hair looks lovely in this light."

"Like I said, half of what comes out of that mouth of yours."

 

 

After a long and festivity-full day it was time to get some sleep. 

Their new friend Hadsi handed the Doctor a key and said, "Now, you won't be needed until the afternoon, so we'll understand if you want to sleep until then. We would of course be thrilled if you'd attend the earlier ceremonies, but it's not essential."

The Doctor took the key and nodded as though he had any idea what was going on. "And Donna is..."

"Oh, separate rooms, Doctor, we wouldn't want you two getting ahead of yourselves, would we?" Hadsi chuckled at his own apparently hilarious joke. 

"Sorry?"

"Oh, I apologise, that was a little risque."

"No, what were you saying?"

"You know, with the ceremony tomorrow." The alien gestured quite explicitly.

"Ah," said the Doctor, with growing apprehension. "I think there's been a misunderstanding. Quite a big one."

"You _did_ arrive with the flame-haired virgin, didn't you?" asked Hadsi with narrowed eyes. 

"Oh, I shouldn't think she's..." he caught the alien's expression, "yes, she's certainly never had sex as long as I've known her. Virgin Donna, that's her."

Hadsi leaned forwards a bit. "Are you also... you do know what's required, don't you? If not, I have some pamphlets."

The Doctor nodded, stomach twisting round inside him. "I do have some experience in the area."

"Good, then there are no problems."

"Nope, none at all." 

The Doctor followed the alien to his room, mind racing.

 

 

"Donna."

"Piss off," she replied, muffled by a pillow.

"Donna, it's important."

She sighed and opened her eyes a bit. "If you've tied your shoelaces together again..."

"This ceremony tomorrow... it's very important that we don't attend."

Donna opened her eyes fully and looked at him. "Why? Is it the death sort of ceremony?"

"The sex sort."

Donna sat up quickly. "I'm not shagging on demand!"

"I know, that's why we have to leave. Now." His eyes drifted downwards.

Donna followed his gaze and pulled a sheet up over herself. "It was very warm," she said, defensively. She pointed to a corner of the room. "I put my clothes on that chair, chuck them over. And don't look."

The Doctor carried her clothes over, trying very hard not to look at the naked companion in the room. 

"I should have known there'd be a catch. Guests of honour, my arse."

The Doctor listened to her dress and stared at his own feet. "I promise I didn't think this sort of thing would happen. It's only ever happened to me twice, and I've been around a _lot_."

"How did you escape before?"

"First one didn't mind and the second one blew the place up."

"Got any explosives on you?" asked Donna, with a whoosh of fabric.

"Sorry."

"I'm decent, you can look."

The Doctor turned round and nodded. "We'll just run off back to the TARDIS, shouldn't be too many people around at this time of night. They've got a long day ahead of them."

"I bloody hope not."

The Doctor opened the door quietly and they headed out into the corridor. He took her hand and led the way through the darkness. "Keep quiet," he whispered. 

"I _am_ keeping quiet," she whispered back. 

They were halfway to the TARDIS when the lights went on.

"Shit," said Donna. 

"Oh, there you are," said the Doctor to the unimpressed-looking aliens before them. "We were just taking a walk. You know, bit of fresh air before all the excitement tomorrow."

"You must stay in your rooms until sent for," said one of them.

"We left something in our ship. Something very important."

"Couldn't possibly shag without it," said Donna, helpfully.

The Doctor shushed her with a hand. "There's been a terrible misunderstanding, I tried to explain earlier..."

"The ceremony must take place!" cried one of the aliens, who hadn't seemed that important before. Everyone had an opinion these days.

"But we're not... and she's not... Look, we're... can't you find someone else?"

"Do you know how hard it is to find a flame-haired virgin these days?"

"Virgin?!" Donna looked offended.

"We're not even the same species!" protested the Doctor, trying another approach.

"That's not what our scans had to say."

The Doctor and Donna looked at each other. "Metacrisis," they said as one. Donna still hadn't quite recovered, and the dying fragments could easily convince a machine that she was something of a Time Lord. 

"If we - hypothetically - didn't go through with this..?" asked the Doctor. 

"You would have offended the goddess Satri. Punishment would be required."

"Which would be... a slap on the wrist and no toast before bed?"

The locals looked at them silently. 

"Ah," said the Doctor, "more of a death sort of punishment." He sighed. "Isn't it bloody always?"

Donna tapped him on the arm. "I don't want to die. Darling."

"Of course you don't, my... sweet... peppermint?"

"Let's just go back to bed and then tomorrow we can help these lovely people with their fertility festival." Donna yawned unconvincingly. "Gosh, I'm tired."

 

 

"Open the window," called the Doctor as loudly as he dared. 

Donna hurried over to let him in, catching him as he half-fell into the room. 

"How far down is it?" she asked, looking out. "I don't think I can fall that far," she said, finally.

"We can climb along the balconies, there's a tree about twenty metres away."

" _You_ can, I bloody well can't."

"What?" he asked, confused.

"Heights," she said. 

He looked at the fear in her eyes. "You're scared of heights? You never mentioned being scared of heights. You were fine at the Towers of Basto."

"No one was asking me to crawl along the outside of those, were they?" She pulled herself up a bit. "It's not the heights, it's the falling from them that scares me."

"Donna, we have to get out of here!"

"I know that! Which of us is the flame-haired virgin here, eh?"

There was a knock at the door. They turned and stared at it, barely breathing. 

"Miss Donna, is there a problem?"

"No problem," she called, "just having a bit of a walk before bed."

The Doctor grabbed her arm and pulled her towards the window. "I'll make sure you don't fall."

"How?"

"I'm a Time Lord!"

"A _skinny_ Time Lord. I'd pull you off the balcony and we'd die together."

"So you'd rather have sex with me tomorrow?"

"If I fall, I'm going to kill you," said Donna, climbing up on the window-sill. 

 

"Just jump!"

"I can't!"

"I'll catch you!"

Donna looked down from the tree. "We really need to have a talk about your masculiniy and how it doesn't give you infinte strength."

The Doctor held his arms out. "Are you having body image issues again? I bet I could catch you." He sighed, seeing her unconvinced expression. "At the very least my bony body will break your fall."

"Right, I'm letting go now."

"I'm wait... oof!" He did catch Donna, but dropped her almost instantly. "It was the velocity," he managed as she picked herself up and glared at him. "I could have caught you if gravity hadn't intervened."

"Let's just get out of here. Where's the TARDIS?"

"Other side of the building." 

They pressed themselves against the walls as they moved through the gardens. They fell a few times in the dark, before finally rounding a corner and seeing the TARDIS. And her guards.

"Shit," said Donna. "We could make a run for it?"

"We'll have to."

They ran across the darkened grass, hand in hand, until they were inevitably spotted. 

"You go left, I'll go right," said the Doctor, pushing Donna to one side.

"Good luck."

 

"At least we're in the same room now," said Donna. "That should make things a bit easier."

"Yeah," said the Doctor, checking his pockets for anything their captors had missed. "Next time I build a sonic screwdriver, I'm disguising it as a toothbrush." He looked at Donna. "I made Sarah Jane one that looks like -"

"I'm not in the mood for one of your stories about your many other women. Has anyone ever told you that you really don't know how to make a girl feel special?"

"I think making you feel special is what we're trying to avoid."

"Yeah," she said, gloomily.

The Doctor knocked on the door of the cell and waited for a response.

"Yes?" Ah, good, it was Hadsi, he was practically the Doctor's best friend.

"Have you ever thought about chucking it all in?"

"Pardon?"

"You know, dropping all this flame-haired virgin stuff and running off to... somewhere with fewer henges?"

"Well, I did once think about travelling to Marinth."

"Ah, an explorer at heart! Me and Donna are in a rather unique position in terms of travelling. Maybe we could come to an agreement, where you get us out of here and we all go off together. See the stars, the planets, the not-that-interesting interstellar dust?"

Hadsi gave him a stern look. "I couldn't betray my people."

"I'm sure they can find another flame-haired virgin. They just need to advertise a bit. Put an ad in the local paper, that sort of thing."

"Your words mean nothing to me," said the alien.

Donna sighed and walked over to the door. "What he means is, they can find someone else to replace us. Does it really have to be a ginger virgin? What about a blonde one? What about a ginger women who just hasn't been out much lately?"

"Satri demands a flame-haired virgin!"

"Look," said the Doctor, "you're missing the point. This is bribery. We offer you something, you let us go. How about some gold? I've got a shedload of gold back in the TARDIS."

"You do realise," said Hadsi, "that the penalty for bribery is death?"

"Is anything on this planet _not_ punished by death?" asked the Doctor, running out of patience with these people. 

"We have a very low crime rate."

"That'll keep you warm on cold nights."

"If you want to leave, there is a way out," said Hadsi.

"Finally" said Donna. 

"Is it death?" asked the Doctor.

Hadsi nodded and Donna hit her head softly off the wall a few times. The Doctor placed a hand between her and the bricks and gently turned her round.

"If this is all so awful to you," said Hadsi, "death might be considered an escape."

"No one's going to die," said the Doctor. He rubbed Donna's back. "We'll all be okay."

 

 

"That's what I hate about religion," said the Doctor, pulling junk from his pockets and staring at the lock. "It starts out nice enough but then before you know it you're locking Edward Woodward in a big wicker man and setting fire to him." He glanced at Donna. "Sorry, didn't mean to spoiler you."

Donna poked him in the arm. "Shut up and get us out of here."

"I... I don't know if I can," he admitted.

"Of course you can! You're the Doctor, you spend half your life escaping from things! It's only a door!"

"With a big old-fashioned lock on it."

"Pick it."

"With what?" he asked, exasperated. "They took all the nice shiny things when they locked us up! We don't _have_ any..." he tailed off. 

Donna followed his gaze. "Yes, let's just give up and stare at my breasts. Why didn't I think of that?"

"Is that underwired?"

"What? Oh!" She caught him in a spontaneous hug. "That's a brilliant idea!" She turned him around and the Doctor heard the rustle of fabric. A warm black bra was pushed into his hands. 

"Now we're getting somewhere!" he said, and ripped into the bra with his teeth. 

Donna stared. 

"What?" he said though a mouthful of cotton. "Didn't have anything sharp."

"Just hurry up."

The Doctor triumphantly removed the underwiring and turned back to the lock. 

The door opened. 

"It is time."

They looked at each other.

 

 

"I can't believe you told them I was a virgin," hissed Donna as they headed towards the henge.

"I didn't! They just assumed on their own."

Donna sniffed. "Do I look like a virgin?"

The Doctor looked her up and down. She was wearing a long white dress and someone had done her hair up with little gold clasps. The dress wasn't quite large enough for her breasts, which were popping out a bit over the neckline. "No," he said after a few moments. "No, you don't."

"Are you saying I look like a slag? Is that it?"

"You don't look slaggy _or_ virginal! You just look... Donna-y."

"Donna-y?"

He nodded. 

"So what's the plan?" she asked.

"Plan?"

"For our last-minute escape."

"Um," said the Doctor. 

"You're useless, you are." She thought for a bit. "What if we just tell them I'm not a virgin?"

The Doctor looked at the assembled masses. "Something tells me they wouldn't really mind."

"So your plan is we just go along with it?" There was a note of panic in her voice. 

"I'm sorry, Donna, I really am so sorry."

"Sorry doesn't bloody help us, does it?" She stopped walking and turned to him. "We _always_ escape!"

Some very sharp knives were pointed at them. The Doctor took Donna's arm and started walking again.

"We're fucked," said Donna, voice wavering slightly. "Literally fucked."

"There's still time, anything could happen." He pulled her a bit closer. "But just in case... I want you to know that it doesn't mean anything."

"Oh, thanks, make it worse, why don't you?"

Did she want..? No, she couldn't possibly. "Okay, it _does_ mean something, but not anything bad. It means... that we're able to cope with any situation."

Donna nodded gloomily. "I suppose it could be worse. At least it's you." She looked up at him. "I do trust you, Doctor. With my life."

"Same here."

"You trust you with your life?" 

"I trust _you_ with my life," he said, worried that she wasn't thinking properly.

"Oh. Thanks."

"I thought you already knew that?" The altar was getting a lot closer now.

"Yeah, but it's nice to hear you say it." She managed a smile. "It's good that we can bond in a time of crisis."

They reached the altar and stopped. This was it, and they still hadn't escaped.

"Do you have to watch?" asked Donna, looking at the crowds around them.

"We have been tricked before," said someone who was presumably some sort of priest.

The Doctor jumped on that. "And did the harvests fail? They didn't, did they? Your ceremony failed and your crops didn't. So you don't have to do this."

"We had to use a blood sacrifice instead."

The Doctor's blood ran cold. "I take it you didn't use an animal?"

"Would you prefer tried that instead?"

The Doctor and Donna looked at each other. "No," they said in unison.

"Let's get it over with," said Donna, lying back on the altar.

The Doctor hopped up next to her on the stone and looked about. "Couldn't at least some of you go away?"

"Let them watch if they have to, the bloody perverts," said Donna. 

"I've never done this before," said the Doctor, awkwardly climbing on top of Donna. 

"Like hell you haven't, I've been in the room next to you and River."

He was pleased that Donna's magnificent bitchiness remained intact. "I mean I've never... had to... not under these circumstances."

Donna patted his cheek. "It's a weird five minutes and then we can go somewhere nice, where people don't threaten to kill us if we don't have sex on demand."

"Five minutes?"

"I never thought I'd say this," said Donna, "but I don't think I want to come."

"Point taken," said the Doctor. 

"I'll lie back and think of England and you do your thing."

He kissed her forehead. "See you on the other side," he whispered.

 

 

The Doctor knocked on the door. 

"Come in," called Donna. 

He entered the bathroom and saw her sitting in the bath with a towel held up in front of her. 

"You probably think it's a bit silly, hiding my modesty after what happened," she said. 

"Nah, I feel the same." He handed her a glass of water and a cup with two pills in it. "These should take care of any unwanted extras."

"Thanks." Donna swallowed the pills and lay back, towel clinging to her wetly. 

"I can make you forget," he said, suddenly.

"What?"

"I can go into your mind, take the memory away. You wouldn't have to know what happened." He flexed his fingers. "Time Lord mojo. Like when I took my memories from you after the metacrisis."

"Don't you dare. I don't mind losing someone else's memories, but my own... if you ever did that I'd... I'd do something horrible to you."

"Then I won't," he said. "Promise." He sat down on the edge of the bath. "Do you need anything else?" He touched her hair lightly and winced when she flinched away from his touch.

"I wouldn't mind a cup of tea," she said.

"Tea. Good idea." He stood up and headed for the door. 

"Doctor?" 

He stopped and turned to her. "Yeah?"

"I still trust you. With my life."

"Same here."


End file.
